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MEMORANDUM 


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Addressed to the Peace Conference 

BY 

J. E. GUESHOFF 

Former Bulgarian Prime Minister 

AND 

D. TSOKOFF 

Former Bulgarian Minister in London 



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Reprinted by 

Macedono-Bulgarian Central Committee 
Chicago, Illinois, 1919 


MEMORANDUM 


We have just learned through the press of the Greek memoran- 
dum presented to the Peace Conference by Mr. Venizelos. Being 
charged by the Bulgarian Government to go to Paris in order to 
defend before the Peace Congress the rights and interests of the 
Bulgarian people, we take the liberty of transmitting to you both 
the refutations called for by that memorandum, and the reflexions 
which are suggested by it. 

To begin with, Mr. Venizelos lays claim to Bulgarian Thrace in 
which, according to his own estimation, there live 88,000 Greeks, 
while the whole Province, prior to the Balkan wars, counted 296,926 
Bulgarians distributed as follows: 


Exarchists 17 6,554 

Uniates 1,700 

Patriarchists 23,170 

Pomaks (Bulgarian Mussulmans) 95,502 


If in 1912 the Bulgarians had agreed that seven Greek candidates 
and only one Bulgarian should be presented at the elections in 
Thrace, it was because, on one side, the six delegates were alloted to 
Thrace which comprised Constantinople and the Dardanelles, as also 
because the Pomaks were counted as Turks, and on the other, in 
virtue of the same electoral compromise the Greeks had Agreed that 
in Macedonia there should stand for election seven Bulgarian candi- 
dates against one Greek (in reality four Greek candidates, of whom 
three for the Chalcidic Peninsula, the caza of Grebena of the Sandjak 
of Monastir, territories never claimed by us) . 

Mr. Venizelos intentionally omits to state the fact that 370,000 
Bulgarians live in that part of Macedonia handed over to Greece by 
the Treaty of Bucharest, 1913. According to the principle invoked by 
Mr. Venizelos, it is not therefore Thrace which should be given to 
Greece but the Bulgarians should be made the possessors of the vast 
territories now held by the Greeks. The insistence with which Mr. 
Venizelos claims Bulgarian Thrace completely shatters the charges 
of imperialism he hurls against the Bulgarians. The latter have 
never desired anything which is not ethnically their own, and they 
have never claimed anything which the Great Powers, as well as 
their neighbours, have not recognised as Bulgarian. 





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’ In fact, uhere exist many international acts which attest the 
Bulgarian character of the territories always claimed by Bulgaria in 
virtue of the nationality principle. In its February issue The Con- 
temporary Review enumerates the most important of these inter- 
national documents. 

Serbia by its treaty of alliance with Bulgaria, signed March 4, 
1912, solemnly recognised to Bulgaria “the right to the territories 
east of the Rhodopes and the river Strouma,” and “pledged itself 
not to formulate any claims in regard to Macedonia, including the 
territory along Albania which was called the ‘ ‘ contested zone ’ ’ ; that 
zone according to the declarations of the late Mr. Milovanovitch, one 
of the signers of the Serbo-Bulgarian Treaty, was to be ceded to Bul- 
garia in case Serbia obtained Bosnia and Herzegovina. 

As to Greece, during the Balkan war she not only consented to 
Bulgaria’s possession of the whole of Thrace as far as Midia-Enos, 
but on April 23, 1913, through Mr. Ghennadius, her delegate to the 
Conference of London, she demanded for a frontier “the line from 
the lakes lying at the base of the Chalcidic Peninsula with a back- 
ground from Salonica sufficient to protect that city from the reach of 
the Bulgarian cannons” (Les Bulgares devant le Congres de la Paix , 
p. 194-195). 

Do similar documents corroborate the pretensions of the Greeks? 
Has Europe ever admitted as ethnically Greek all the territories 
claimed as such by Mr. Venizelos? Have serious scholars conversant 
with the Near-Eastern questions recognised as legitimate the terri- 
torial claims forwarded by the Greeks ? 

Far from it. On the contrary, the names of the writers expert 
on the subject who declare the Greek claims as greatly exaggerated, 
is legion. We will here cite the opinion of Cheradame, an outspoken 
philhellenist, who in his book, Le plan pangermaniste demasque (p. 
232) makes the following statement: “The Greeks in Turkey — so 
the map tells us — form small patches in the Ottoman territory, with- 
out ever forming an agglomeration sufficiently compact to claim the 
incontestable right to a certain part of the Ottoman Empire.” 

In claiming to-day “a well-defined part,” and that of the Balkan 
Peninsula and of Asia Minor, to which part, according to Cheradame, 
the Greeks do not possess “an incontestable right,” is not Mr. 
Venizelos subject to imperialistic tendencies he so readily attributes 
to the Bulgarians? The Bulgarians have never been imperialists. 
Contrary to repeated assertions coming from interested quarters, 
they never aimed at obtaining a hegemony in the Balkans. Their 


/ 


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claims have never gone beyond their ethnical confines. Their con- 
ciliatory spirit will always render them willing to subscribe to a ces- 
sion of certain territory demanded by the economic interests of their 
neighbours, should they themselves, moved by a similar spirit, mani- 
fest a readiness to cede to Bulgaria other territories indispensable 
to its economic development. 

“The democratic conception of the Allied Nations,” says Mr. 
Venizelos, “could not admit of other nationality criterium except the 
national conscience.” And he cites the case of Coritza which town 
in his opinion should revert to Greece, for the simple reason that 
before the Balkan wars it counted 2250 Greek scholars to only 200 
Albanian. Let us apply that criterium to Macedonia: Before the 
Balkan wars there were in it 63,869 Bulgarian scholars against 39,910 
Greek (half of whom were Bulgarian and the other half in districts 
which we have never claimed), and 3305 Serbian (Vladimir Sis: 
Mazedonien, p. 90). 

Mr. Venizelos admits that in 1904 there were in Macedonia 757,- 
532 Exarchists (Bulgarianised Slavs). It is an established fact that 
the total number of the Bulgarians in that Province is about 1,172,136, 
which is 81%% of the entire Christian population ( The Frontiers of 
Language and Nationality in Europe , by Leon Dominian, published 
by the American Geographical Society, New York, 1917). Should 
one care to consult the testimony of European authorities on the 
ethnical character of Macedonia, he may be referred to the documental 
evidences found in la Grande Encyclopedic francaise, and the Encyclo- 
paedia Britannica. 

“If Bulgaria retains the Aegean littoral, she could utilise Porto- 
Lagos as a base for submarines which would allow her to tip in her 
favour the equilibrium of forces between her and Greece. ’ ’ 

“The equilibrium of f orces ? This is a principle which not 
only does not at all figure in President Wilson’s programme of Jan. 
8, 1918, but is expressly condemned by the Entente’s statesmen. And 
when one takes into consideration that Greece, Serbia, and Roumania 
are about to double and treble their size and population, while Bul- 
garia, should she realise in full her national aspiration, will receive 
proportionally a very moderate extension of her frontiers, it is easy 
to see how untenable and contradictory is this argument advanced by 
Mr. Venizelos, 

Mr. Venizelos who makes use of certain articles from the pro- 
gramme of President Wilson omits to cite the one which bears directly 
on the solution of the Balkan problem, namely : “The relations of the 


5 


Balkan States to one another should be determined by friendly coun- 
sel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; 
and international guarantees of the political and economic inde- 
pendence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should 
be entered into.” 

Mr. Venizelos also fails to mention the last article of President 
Wilson’s programme which provides for the creation of a League of 
Nations, “for the purpose of affording to great and small states alike 
mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity.” 

In view of these international guarantees Greece has nothing to 
fear from Bulgaria, not any more than Italy has grounds to fear the 
Yougoslavia because of the ports which might be ceded to it. And if 
a single Bulgarian port will be dangerous for the Aegean borderers, 
how much more so would be the numerous Greek coast towns on the 
Aegean and the Adriatic seas? Would that be a sufficient ground for 
taking them away from Greece? 

Mr. Venizelos himself was of a different opinion in 1912, 1913 
and 1915 when he offered both Thrace and Eastern Macedonia to Bul- 
garia, and when on answering an interpellation in the Greek Chamber 
he said: “If we are to extend our frontier in a continuous line in 
order to englobe all the Greek population in Thrace, Greece so dis- 
tended along the sea and possessing no backbone will become more 
feeble than if her frontiers were rounded up in another sense. ’ ’ ( Car- 
negie Balkan Report , p. 186.) 

In order to conciliate his many “variations,” on the subject of 
territorial concessions which he has made to Bulgaria, Mr. Venizelos 
now asserts that Bulgaria does not merit any, simply because of her 
alliance with the Central Powers, Before envisaging this allegation 
we may be permitted to examine the other complaints made against 
our nation by Mr. Venizelos. 

He reproaches Bulgaria for having in 1913 desired to “treat the 
territorial questions separately with each of its allies.” Mr. Venizelos 
forgets that the treaties which bound Bulgaria to Serbia and Greece 
imposed this mode of action. Bulgaria, the mainspring of the Balkan 
Alliance, served as a connecting link between her allies who had signed 
no treaties between each other, but all of them were separately treaty- 
bound with Bulgaria. In fact, while Serbia in its treaty with Bul- 
garia had recognised the Bulgarian character of the whole of Mace- 
donia, in the Greco-Bulgarian agreement there was made no mention 
of any ethnic delimitation. 

Mr. Venizelos again upbraids Bulgaria for her brusque attack on 


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June 16/29, 1913, though the circumstances are not unknown to him 
that, indeed, on that date General Savoff/did order certain local at- 
tacks against Serbian and Greek detachments, his action, however, was 
at once condemned by the Bulgarian Government which immediately 
dismissed him and ordered the hostilities to be stopped on Bulgarian 
side. Simultaneously Mr. Sasonoff was telegraphically asked to inter- 
vene at Belgrade and Athens that the military operations be sus- 
pended. To the demand of Mr. Sasonoff the Greek and Serbian gov- 
ernments answered by declaring war on Bulgaria. But the treaty 
concluded on May 19, that is, a month before the fatal attack, doesn’t 
it throw sufficient light on those events? Greece and Serbia had 
pledged each other (Art. 2) “not to engage in any separate under- 
standing with Bulgaria, to be ready to offer each other an effective 
aid, and to always march in accord and mutually support their terri- 
torial claims.” .... Further on (Art. 4) the Greco-Serbian pact 
stipulated that “the frontier lines shall be established on the prin- 
ciple of actual occupation and the equilibrium of the three states” — 
two principles which not only did not figure in their respective treaties 
with Bulgaria, but did not at all tally with their declarations and 
obligations to submit their disputes to arbitration. 

The Entente has always explicitly declared that it is fighting for 
the right of the peoples. President Wilson said in his discourse on 
Sept. 27 last, that impartial justice should be meted out to both the 
victors and vanquished. Mr. Venizelos in speaking of the Bulgarians 
calls them enemies. Should the Bulgarians be considered as such ? 

Technically, yes. But then the Austro-Hungarian Slavs who for 
more than thirty years had borne an alliance with Germany, and who 
in this war fought in the ranks of the Austro-Hungarian army, were 
also technically enemies and all we ask is, that we should be treated 
as they are treated. 

In order that he may throw upon the entire Bulgarian people the 
responsibility of Bulgaria’s entry in the war, Mr. Venizelos points 
out to the solidarity of the opposition with the Radoslavoff Cabinet. 
He maintains that the leaders of the Bulgarian opposition in unison 
with Radoslavoff demanded, prior to Bulgaria’s participation in the 

war “besides the whole of Serbian Macedonia, a large part of 

the Kingdom of Serbia before the Balkan wars, a large part of 
Albania, in order to become a power bordering on the Adriatic . . . . , 
the whole of Dobroudja including Old Dobroudja ceded to Roumania 
in 1878.” 

We deny most categorically the veracity of those assertions of 


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Mr. Venizelos and challenge any one who might think he can refute 
our statements. What the Bulgarian opposition tried to do was to 
thwart the policy of the Radoslavoff Government. The book of Mr. 
Marcel Dunan, correspondent of the “Temps” ( L’Ete bulgare , Paris, 
1916), touches upon this point in a very simple and unambiguous 
manner. It is a diary of an impartial spectator eager to see and hear 
everything, to survey all things on the spot and narrate in the smallest 
minuteness the events which crowded themselves up prior to Bul- 
garia’s plunging into the world conflict. 

The ‘‘impartial justice” of President Wilson, “and the justice 
which” “n’a point de favoris” of President Poincare, Mr. Venizelos 
would replace with “strict justice” towards the enemy. According 
to what code of law can Mr. Venizelos exonerate his own people from 
all responsibility in the policy pursued by King Constantine up to 
1915 but hold the Bulgarian people responsible for the policy of Tsar 
Ferdinand ? 

“The Powers know that I have neglected nothing in my efforts 
to make Greece identify its fate with theirs in this world conflict.” 
These words of Mr. Venizelos may equally be applied to the Bulgarian 
Opposition leaders who represented the great majority of the people. 
It was they who up to 1915 did all they could to prevent Bulgaria 
from going with Germany. If Bulgaria’s geographical situation were 
like that of Greece, she would have acted as Greece did in her relations 
with the Entente Powers. Is it just, therefore, to punish her because 
of her geographical position? Such being the case, was the Bulgarian 
Opposition facilitated in its action? Did any one respond to its 
requests? While Greece was frequently vivsited by missi dominici of 
the Entente, Mr. Delcasse refused to grant passports to the French 
delegates, Longuet and Outrey, who were designated by the Commit- 
tee of Foreign Affairs to come to Sofia (see Le Pays du 15 X 1918). 
The Bulgarian Opposition asked for a debarkation of Entente troops 
at Salonica (L’Ete bidgare, p. 350), believing that such a military 
measure would greatly strengthen its protestations. If the landing 
had taken place in time Bulgaria would never have been dragged on 
the side of the Central Powers. Is it fair to treat now Bulgaria dif- 
ferently from Greece, especially when one recalls that it was Mr. 
Venizelos himself who protested against the landing of the Entente 
forces at Salonica? (see The Growth of Anti-V enizelism , in New 
Europe of Dec. 21, 1915). 

At the moment while we are writing the present memorandum, 
we read in the press extracts from the report on the Serbian claims 


8 


presented to the Peace Conference by Mr. Pashitch. The first dele- 
gate of a country which the Entente saved from ruin and helped to 
triple its population, Mr. Pashitch makes a vivid contrast with the 
exemplary modesty and moderation manifested by no other than the 
representatives of martyred Belgium. Mr. Pashitch pretends not to 
remember that the late Mr. Milovanovitch ceded Macedonia to Bul- 
garia, and trampling upon all the principles of President Wilson 
which he, however, never fails to invoke whenever Serbia’s claims 
come in conflict with those of Italy and Greece, he now tries to lay 
hands on territories belonging to Bulgaria since her emancipation. 
This flagrant discord between the principles resorted to by the Serbian 
delegation and the reclamations forwarded by it is apparent to all. 

It was to Count Andrassy that Serbia owes the possession of the 
Pirot district; it was due to her treaty with Austria concluded in 
1880 that her attention was turned to Macedonia, a land until then 
recognised as Bulgarian by the Serbians themselves (see the Carnegie 
Balkan Commission, p. 7). It is to Emperor William of Germany 
that Greece is indebted for the^ acquisition of the districts of Drama, 
Serres, and Cavalla. 

Thus favoured by the Central Empires, the Serbs and Greeks 
seem to forget that the principles which are taken as a basis for the 
establishment of a future treaty of peace have nothing in common 
with those of the Central Powers. Not contented with the fact that 
they to-day are holding in their hands territories inhabited by more 
than a million of Bulgarians, they now go so far as to demand parts 
of Bulgaria proper itself, which they have never done even during 
their alliance with the Germanic Empires. We would have never 
imagined that the Serbs and Greeks w r ould go so far as to run counter 
to the great principles of the Entente. 

The Bulgarian people would be very naive to expect from Greeks 
and Serbs any acknowledgment for the great sacrifices which it made 
in the struggle of 1912, but elementary justice requires that they at 
least should not reject it in such a hard manner, simply because of the 
mistakes of its government. 

‘ ‘ Greece and Serbia on the occasion had the good fortune to make 
the least sacrifices and efforts and to gain the greatest advantages. 
Both of them almost doubled their territories and population. They 
greatly profited by the victories won by Bulgaria at a very high price 
and with an enormous and cruel loss of life.” The Serbians and 
Greeks can ill-afford to disregard this appreciation uttered by the late 
Francis de Pressense on the Balkan wars. Let them leave to others 


9 


to evoke the spectcre of Bulgaria’s alleged aspirations for the 
hegemony of the Balkans. 

The Paris Conference cannot produce any thing viable and dura- 
ble unless it avoids the mistakes committed at Berlin in 1878. Such 
blunders excusable for that period will be unjustifiable after a bitter 
experience of forty years, and after the categorical declarations of the 
Entente, that it is combating for the rights of the small states. Mr. 
Llyod George himself has enumerated the small nations in his Cardiff 
speech of Oct. 27, 1916, more than a year after Bulgaria’s entry into 
the war. “The great Powers,” said he, “have never quite realised 
the value of Belgium, of Serbia, of Montenegro, of Bulgaria, of Greece, 
of Roumania.” And in order that the Conference’s work of justice 
which the world is impatiently waiting be accomplished in the spirit 
of perfect impartiality and exactitude, we once more beg of the Con- 
gress to allow that Bulgaria’s case be heard before the decision of its 
fate be pronounced, before its future boundary lines settled. 

We are perfectly confident that those who, as has said President 
Poincare, to-day are “opening the gates of gaols,” and are “breaking 
the chains” of the oppressed, would never consent to become instru- 
mental in forging new ones, because it might offend their small allies 
in seeing applied the great principles for which the Entente is fight- 
ing the good fight. 


SECOND MEMORANDUM 


Charged by the Bulgarian Government with the semi-official mis- 
sion of defending the interests of the Bulgarian people before the 
Peace Conference, we consider it our duty, after our answer to the 
Greek claims to Bulgarian lands, to reply to the territorial pretentions 
forwarded by the Serbian Delegation. 

Serbia forgets Art. 11 of President Wilson’s programme which 
not only denies her the right to lay claims to any portion of the King- 
dom of Bulgaria, but on the contrary makes it imperative upon Serbia 
to give back to Bulgaria all the territories she has usurped from her 
in the past, which not only all impartial and thorough ethnographers, 
but the Serbians themselves, have recognised as incontestably Bul- 
garian. Serbia forgets that in virtue of the Treaty of March 13, 1912, 
she has admitted Macedonia as Bulgarian, in which, according to 
Leon Dominian (The Frontiers of Language and Nationality in 
Europe, published by the American Geographical Society of New 
York, 1917, p. 205), the most recent authority on the subject, 81.2% 
of the Christian population are Bulgarians. Serbia also forgets that 
it was Austria who in order to turn oft her attention from Bosnia and 
Herzegovina inculcated a Macedonian policy in her (The Carnegie 
Report, p. 7), and that at the moment she acquired those two prov- 
inces she was to give Macedonia back to Bulgaria. 

Laying aside all these facts, Serbia to-day seeks to gain more 
Bulgarian territory, and in so doing, she is resorting to “ historical 
and ethnographical” facts, the inconsistencies of which are so con- 
spicuous, that one is at a loss to understand how she could imagine 
she could rely on them in pleading her cause before the Peace 
Tribunal. 

Let us examine one by one these “ historical and ethnographical 
facts, ’ ’ 

I. “The Bulgarians,” declare the Serbians in their Report, 
“down to 862 had not made their appearance south of the Balkans 

they had at various times invaded Thrace and Macedonia, but 

lost them as soon again. ’ ’ — 

The following data will help to show how wrong and unfounded 


11 


are the Serbian assertions as to the “rapid retreats ” of the Bul- 
garians. 

a) Already in 716, in virtue of the Treaty concluded between Bul- 
garia and Byzantium the first was in possession of Northern 
Thrace, and hence of the southern part of the Balkans. 

b) Sofia and upper Struma south of the Balkans were under 
Bulgarian rule from 809 until 1018. 

c) According to the Treaty concluded in 814-815 between Bul- 
garian and Byzantine Empire the whole Northern Thrace 
from the Black Sea to the Rilo Mountains was included within 
the Bulgarian frontiers. 

d) Belgrade, the present capital of Serbia, was in the hands of 
the Bulgarians from 829 clear to the beginning of the eleventh 
century. 

e) Northern and Central Macedonia were ruled by the Bulgari- 
ans from 838 to 1018. 

II. * ‘ The Turks conquered Bulgaria in 1396. Since that date up 
to 1878, the Bulgarians remained inactive and submissive under the 
yoke of the Turks. ’ ’ 

This is a pure Serbian legend and invention. It is far from the 
truth that the Bulgarians contrary to the Serbians, who assert to have 
bowed no head to the Turks, are slaves by temperaments, listless and 
resigned, and have patiently endured five centuries-long bondage. 
Among the peoples conquered by the Turks none of them has risen 
in revolt as often as the Bulgarian race. 

Here are the most important Bulgarian insurrections recorded 
in history: 

1. The Pirot insurrection in 1405, under the leadership of Con- 
stantine, son of Strashimir, the King of Viddin. 

2. The great Bulgarian insurrection, 1595-1596, starting in 
Tirnovo, the old Bulgarian capital, and spreading through 
Sofia, Pirot, Negotin, Ochrida, and other centers. 

3. The Insurrection of Kiprovtsi, 1688. 

4. That of Nishava 1841, so-called the Nish Insurrection in the 
reports of the French, Austrian, Russian, and English con- 
suls, according to which “225 Bulgarian villages were de- 
stroyed/' 

5. The Viddin Revolt in 1851. 

6. The Thrace and the Maleshevo insurrections in 1876. 

7. The Kresna Revolt in 1878. 

8. That of Ochrida, 1881. 

9. That of Pirin, 1895. 

10. The Bitolia in 1903, in which took part more than 30,000 Bul- 
garian insurgents from Western Macedonia. 


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III. “The Serb Patriarchy of Ipek had included the Samokov 
and Kustendil bishoprics, ’ ’ affirms the Serbian Report in order to 
justify Serbia’s claim to the purely Bulgarian town of Kustendil. 

In answer to this assertion we will say that for centuries (IX, X, 
XI, and up to the first half of the XIII), Belgrade, the Serbian cap- 
ital, was under the jurisdiction of the Bulgarian Patriarchate (of 
Preslav, Ochrida, and Tirnovo). Notwithstanding this fact, however, 
the Bulgarians to-day never think of laying claims to that city. 

Kustendil, Samokov, and Northern Macedonia, though for a cer- 
tain time passed under the jurisdiction of the Serbian church, the 
Serbian patriarchs, as is evident from various documents, always 
recognised that they had exercised religious jurisdiction over Bul- 
garian lands in distinction from the Serbian. In 1371, during the 
conquest of Kustendil by the Turks, the Turkish chronicles testify 
that the territory conquered w T as a Bulgarian land (diar Bolgar). The 
submission of certain Bulgarian parts to the Serbian church was 
effected in 1557 through the aid of the Grand Vizier Mehmed, a 
Serbian by descent, who paved the way for his Christian brother 
Makari to the post of Serbian Patriarch. As to the Serbian pre- 
tensions to Viddin, that city has never been in their possession either 
spiritually or politically. Its population has always preserved its 
genuine Bulgarian character. During the XIVth century Viddin was 
the capital of the Bulgarian Tsar Strashimir. It fell under the Turks 
in 1396. 

The town of Stroumitsa which also is desired by the Serbians has 
never belonged to the Serbian Patriarchy of Ipek. 

IV. The Serbian Report asserts that the population known as 
SJiopes is “Serbian in origin,” and that its racial physiognomy, lan- 
guage, and national customs (slava, zadrouga, &c.) are clear evidences 
of their Serbian character. All this is nothing but phraseology. 

These SJiopes whom M. Miatovitch, former Serbian Minister in 
London, describes in his ‘ ‘ Memoirs ’ ’ as Bulgarians of the purest blood, 
with Sofia as their capital, constitute in reality one of the most repre- 
sentative Bulgarian tribes. Their analytic dialect, their white apparel, 
their national name of “Bulgarians,” their customs and popular be- 
liefs, their intense Bulgarian consciousness, presents a vivid contrast 
with the Serbs, and, therefore, form with the rest of the Bulgarians 
an indivisible entity. As to the slava (patron feast) and the zadrouga 
(family reunion), alluded to by the Serbian Report as characteristics 
of the Serbian race, we will say that these customs are in vogue among 
all Bulgarians, as also in certain Russian districts. In regard to the 


13 


patron feast , if that is to be considered as ground for Serbian claim 
to Bulgarian lands, the Serbs may just as well pretend to the in- 
heritance of ancient Rome, so famous for its feasts. Moreover, the 
Byzantine chronicles touching these patron feasts celebrated by the 
southern Slavs during the Xlth century are chiefly concerned with the 
Bulgarians. In 1018, Ivatch, the military chief of the Bulgarian Tsar 
Samuel, celebrated his patron feast on the day of the Holy Virgin. 

All towns, like Viddin, Koula, Kustendil, Petritch, Stroumitsa 
and their suburbs do not figure as Serb but as purely Bulgarian dis- 
tricts in the ethnographic map of 1913 published by the Serbian Prof. 
Tsvyitch, at present technical councillor with the Serbian Delegation 
at Paris. 

V. The Serbian Report asserts that the population in the terri- 
tories now claimed by them had sent to the Berlin Congress of 1878 
petitions begging to be allowed to remain under Serbian rule. This 
is what the Russian General Anoushkin, a member of that Congress, 
says on the point: 

“This morning (July 2nd) I visited Shouvaloff. There I met 
Ristitch who was engaged in a strong propaganda for securing to 
Serbia, Pirot and Trin, besides Vranya which it already possesses. He 
was so far carried away in his verbosity as to assert that the popula- 
tion of the parts in question desired to become Serb. He pretended 
to have received numerous declarations to that effect and argued that 
should a plebiscite be taken all the inhabitants would without hesita- 
tion manifest their will in favour of joining Serbia. Being familiar 
with the actual state of things, I challenged the validity of his state- 
ments. I told him that if there were voices favouring Serbia, it was 
due mainly to the fact that those localities, unfortunately, were occu- 
pied by Serbian troops, and that the Serbian administration was com- 
mitting terrible excesses and was compelling the clergy to mention 
the name of Prince Milan in their prayers. The metropolitan of 
Pirot having protested against the Serbian regime was arrested and 
taken to Nish where he was imprisoned. How may one speak of 
plebiscite under such conditions? That would be a shameful comedy 
played to the swing of the natchalniks’ stick who have become lords 
of the country, chiefly because we did not occupy it with our troops. 
Ristitch was intensely irritated but said not a word to refute my argu- 
ments. ’ ’ 

Just the contrary — that population in 1878 forwarded many peti- 
tions to Tsar Alexander II, and to the Russian Go vevrnor- General at 
Sofia, entreating to be delivered from the Serbians and be united with 
Bulgaria, their mother country. 


14 


In reference to the evidence of Count Ignatieff, if he were to have 
his own way the entire San Stefano Bulgaria would have been given 
to the Bulgarians, as is made plain from the following statement 
found in the Russian magazine, Rouskoe Bogatstvo, 1900, p. 270: 
“When after the Treaty of San Stefano a Serbian Minister plenipo- 
tentiary reproached Count Ignatieff for his partiality towards the 
Bulgarians before the conclusion of that treaty, the Count jumping 
up drew out of his bureau all the papers consulted during the nego- 
tiations and unfolded before his interlocutor the Serbian maps and 
books which confirmed the fact that the territories attributed to the 
Bulgarians were not Serbian but Bulgarian.” 

VI. In order to strengthen the Serbian claims and the demand 
for strategic frontiers, the Report points out to alleged duplicity 
manifested by the Bulgarians toward the Serbs, both in the past and 
in the present. To this it must be stated that history affirms just the 
opposite. 

During the IXth century Mountimir, the Serbian ruler, estab- 
lished his authority thanks to the aid which was given him by Prince 
Boris of Bulgaria. In 917 the Jupanship of Zachlumie gained its 
hegemony over the Serbian tribes, then engaged in war, always with 
the support of the Bulgarians. And when in 932 the Bulgarian army 
tried to put an end to the internecine strifes among the Serbians, it 
was assailed and beaten by the latter and the heads of the Bulgarian 
chiefs were sent to Byzantium. In 924 when the Bulgarian Tsar 
Simeon was besieging Constantinople, the Serbians attacked the Bul- 
garians from the back. Having concluded peace with the Byzantine 
Empire, Simeon turned his armies against the Serbian jupans and 
punished them for their traitorous action. In 930, while civil war 
was raging in Bulgaria, the Serbs took advantage, and after coming 
into secret understanding with Byzantium, fell upon the Bulgarians. 

Towards the end of the Xth century, Samuel, the Bulgarian Tsar, 
being engaged in war with the Serbs in Dioclea, vanquished them and 
made their Prince Ivan- Vladimir prisoner. Later on he placed him 
again in power and gave him the hand of his daughter Kossara. In 
1073 the Bulgarians rose against the Byzantine domination and re- 
quested the Serbian Prince Michael to give them as Tsar his son Bodin. 

At the battle of'Velboujde (1330) the Serbians demanded a two 
day armistice. The Bulgarians agreed and meanwhile sent a forage 
party to the villages. Thereupon the Serbians treacherously attacked 
the camp of the Bulgarian Tsar whom they killed. The war of 1885 
is a good illustration of Serbian treachery. While the Bulgarian army 


15 


was concentrated towards Adrianople against the Turks, the Serbians 
struck them from the rear. The Bulgarians soon succeeded in beat- 
ing them at Slivnitsa and Pirot. It was Austria which saved them 
from the victorious Bulgarian arms. 

In 1913 the Serbians did not wish to execute the treaty concluded 
in 1912 and came into a secret understanding with the Greeks on 
May 19th, 1913, that is, more than a month before the second Balkan 
war. And it was they, and not the Bulgarians, who declared the war 
with the proclamation of King Peter, June 18-31st, 1913 (Gueshoff: 
The Balkan League, chap. IV). The Bulgarians had stopped hostili- 
ties and had proposed to lay the question at issue to arbitrage. 

“The injustice done to the Serbians by the Treaty of Berlin,’ ’ 
argues the Serbian Report, “should to-day be rectified.” How little 
justified their complaint against the Berlin Congress is may be judged 
by the fact that the Great Powers through their representatives at 
the Constantinople Conference in 1876 had given the district of Nish to 
Bulgaria, while at Berlin in 1878 they ceded it to Serbia. One should 
read among other authorities the book of Blanqui entitled : Voyage en 
Bulgarie, published in 1841, in order to convince himself of the Bul- 
garian character of that district. Blanqui who was sent to Nish by 
Guizot to investigate the insurrection, speaks of that city as the capital 
of Bulgaria. He calls the bishop of Nish Primate of Bulgaria. He is 
filled with horror at the ghastly pyramid made up of several thou- 
sands Christian skulls, which was raised at the very gates of the city, 
and remarked that a day perhaps would come when on that spot 
‘ ‘ Free Bulgaria would erect a temple in their memory. ’ ’ 

After the testimony of Count Ignatieff, called forth by the 
Serbians themselves, that Bulgaria of the San Stefano Treaty did not 
include Serbians, after that of Blanqui, who declares that the whole 
of the Nish District is Bulgarian, it is superfluous to multiply the 
citations which prove that the principle of nationalities has been com- 
pletely disregarded in Morava in favour of Serbia. 

Feeling the untenability of their position, historically and eth- 
nographically, and forgetting that Croats and Slovens up to Novem- 
ber last were fighting the Entente on the side of Austro-Hungary, the 
Serbians reproach Bulgaria for its participation in the world war. 
The great majority of the Bulgarian people represented by the Opposi- 
tion was against war. The members of the present Bulgarian Cabinet 
did all they could in 1915 to prevent their country from going with 
the Central Powers. Could as much be said of certain members of the 
Austrian Cabinet of Seidel who to-day compose the Serbian Delega- 


16 


LIBRARY Ur LUNUKtii 


tion at Paris? What then is the difference betwe 0 019 221 930 9 f 
and the Bulgarians? Both of them driven into the conflict by a 
monarch alien to their race and terrorised by draconian measures 
were constrained to fight against the Entente forces. How may the 
Bulgarians be blamed for not raisin or a revolution when no symptom 
of such existed among the Yougoslavs? If the latter after having for 
forty years tolerated an alliance with Germany, if Serbia after she 
was for some twenty years in alliance with Austria-Hungary, merit 
the confidence of the Entente, why should the Bulgarian people, who 
were only for three years the unwilling partners of the Central Pow- 
ers, be considered less worthy of such a favour? 

We maintain all we have said on this point and on the subject of 
our territorial claims in our answer to the memoir of Mr. Venizelos. 

And firmly believing in the spirit of impartiality by which the Peace 
Congress is guided in its unshaken decision to solve the Balkan prob- 
lem in conformity with Art. 11 of President Wilson’s programme and 
with the great principles for the triumph of which the Allies have 
fought, we earnestly request it to disregard the exaggerated preten- 
sions of our neighbours, and to adjudge to Bulgaria the lands which, 
both the Great Powers and our neighbours themselves, have on so 
many occasions pronounced as Bulgarian legitimate heritage. 

In this manner only may a just and lasting peace be established 
in the Balkan Peninsula so long the victim of an erring European 
diplomacy. 



